2009 grand-prize winner HydroSense is acquired by Belkin International

“HydroSense won the grand prize at the inaugural Environmental Innovation Challenge in April 2009 with a water-usage monitoring technology that screws onto a single valve in a home and can detect water use down to each specific toilet, shower, and faucet,” says Jon Froehlich, a PhD student in computer science. “This type of highly granular monitoring data can fundamentally shift how households, utilities, and policy makers think about and understand water consumption.”

After winning the UW EIC, Froehlich and his student team of engineers and computer scientists entered the UW Business Plan Competition, adding MBAs from the Foster School of Business to the team to help refine the HydoSense business model and investment pitch. One of 90 teams at the outset of the event, they made it to the Final Round of the competition, winning a $5,000 prize and the $2,500 Best Clean-Tech Idea award.

“Our success generated a lot of visibility, and we received queries from a number of potential investors and acquirers,” Froehlich said. “The HydroSense research team is led by UW Professor Shwetak Patel, and I’m one of two graduate students on the project. Within about six months, the UW TechTransfer office negotiated a licensing deal, and the HydroSense technology was acquired as part of a larger energy portfolio by Belkin International earlier this year. We went from being a research idea to being bought by a major international company that has the resources to commercialize HydroSense on a massive scale. Now that’s impact!”

For Belkin International’s acquisition of HydroSense/Zensi, see news release.

About the Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship

The Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship at the Foster School runs undergraduate programs including the highly competitive Lavin Entrepreneurship Program, graduate programs including the Technology Entrepreneurship Certificate, and the Jones + Foster Accelerator. The Buerk Center also hosts three large competitions focused on student innovation: the UW Business Plan Competition (founded in 1998), the Alaska Airlines Environmental Innovation Challenge (founded in 2009), and the Health Innovation Challenge.